Golf Cart Batteries Drained Too Fast!

by Jim Walder
(Panama City, FL)

I am a courtesy cart driver with a GatorMoto 9 person shuttle. I go from the hotel to parking lot across the street, anywhere from 6 to 15 round trips per hour. Always with at least 3-4 passengers per trip. Cannot keep this comfortable shuttle in service for more than two to three hours max. Company says is good for 50 miles. Average round trip is no more than one mile. I am forced to drive a clunker Kawasaki shuttle or a very cramped EZ Go. Unit is slightly more than a year old.

It was delivered with eight Trojan T105 batteries but with regardless of how long we plug in the onboard charger the unit will only last two or so hours. Never an eight hour shift.

Hi, Jim -
15 round trips in an hour? You're not getting the company-promised miles out of your cart because of the "lead-foot tax", also known as the Peukert effect. Means that when you accelerate hard with 3-4 supersized Americans in the cart, you drain your batteries faster.

Here's a solution. Ready? It's so simple you're going to laugh.

Get yourself 8 more of those batteries - crib them from the clunker cart if you have to - and then swap them out before they get too tired, maybe after an hour and a half or two hours. It's pretty quick and easy to do (takes about 15 minutes), and you'll save your batteries some cycle life by not draining them so far.

Batteries charge very quickly up to the 80% mark, so you could opportunity-charge the ones that are not in use (you've got an off-board charger, or another cart with an onboard charger you can use as a charging station?) while you use the second set.

Regards,
Lynne